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12/11/2012
CULIACAN, Mexico – The former police chief in the western Mexican state of Sinaloa was found fatally shot Tuesday, police sources told Efe.
The half-naked body of Alfredo Mejia Perez was discovered in Culiacan, the state capital.
Mejia had multiple bullet wounds and the scene was littered with shell casings from an AR-15 assault rifle, the sources said.
Sinaloa’s former top cop, a retired military officer commonly known as “Major Mejia,” was abducted Monday from his home on the outskirts of Culiacan by several heavily armed assailants.
Security forces moved quickly to cordon off the area where [...]
Not even Latin America’s most fanciful television soap operas could have come up with a twist as farcical – or as sinister – as the dramatic Mexican military assault last week that killed one of the country’s most ruthless drug cartel chiefs.
10/13/2012
Tony Allen-Mills / The Times
First, a squad of navy commandos failed to realise that it had killed Heriberto Lazcano, a founder of a notorious gang of former military thugs known as the Zetas. Then Lazcano’s henchmen stole their leader’s unguarded corpse. Now an even more treacherous and bloodthirsty character is ready to fill his [...]
10/13/2012
MEXICO CITY – The U.S. government knew that a suspect fatally shot by Mexican marines was the head of the widely feared Zetas drug cartel well before the marines left the body unguarded in a small-town funeral home, where it was stolen in a pre-dawn raid by armed men, U.S. officials told The Associated Press.
The U.S. had independently verified the identity of Zeta founder and leader Heriberto Lazcano, killed in a shootout Sunday in a northern Mexican town, before his body was stolen at about 1 a.m. Monday, according to a U.S. law enforcement official who [...]
10/13/2012
LA Herald Tribune
MONTERREY, Mexico – Nine suspected criminals and two soldiers were killed in a clash pitting Mexican army troops and gunmen in the northeastern border city of Matamoros, where numerous road blockades also were set up, officials said.
A government spokesman in Tamaulipas state, where Matamoros is located, said the 11 deaths occurred during a chase and shootout on Friday.
That morning, numerous roadblocks were set up on the Matamoros-Reynoso highway and on streets and avenues in Matamoros and nearby towns, he said.
Gunmen removed people from cargo trucks and cars and used the vehicles [...]
10/13/2012
Mexican army soldiers killed a suspected high-ranking leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel in a clash early Saturday, the Sinaloa state Attorney General’s Office told Efe.
Manuel Torres Felix, alias “El M1″ or “El Ondeado,” was killed in a clash between army troops and suspected cartel gunmen on a road leading to the town of Oso Viejo, they said.
Torres Felix was the brother of Javier Torres, “El JT,” who until his arrest in 2004 was one of the top lieutenants of senior Sinaloa cartel leader Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada.
After his brother’s arrest, Manuel Torres Felix [...]
10/13/2012
By Will Grant / BBC
Heriberto Lazcano, the leader of Los Zetas, one of the Mexico’s most feared and brutal drugs gangs, was killed this week in a shoot-out with the Mexican marines. This news was not a major surprise to Mexico-watchers – but then something strange happened.
The life of a drug lord is generally pretty short.
The world’s most notorious was probably “El Patron” – the Colombian cocaine baron, Pablo Escobar, who died aged 44, barefoot, bloated and riddled with bullets on a rooftop in Medellin.
Most do not rise that high in the drugs [...]
10/12/2012
Several clashes between Army troops and groups of armed men have triggered a series of blockades to the West of Matamoros and small towns of the area.
Local police reported that the shooting started at noon in the town of Control, located in the Matamoros-Reynosa Highway. Shootings were also reported in the towns of Control Ramirez and Empalme.
The confrontations originated several vehicle chases that extended to several areas inside Matamoros city.
Blockades are being reported in avenues Lauro Villar, 12 de Marzo, Marte R. Gomez, Del Nino, and Portes Gil.
Federal forces maintain a [...]
10/12/2012
by Nathan Jones / Baker Institute Blog
Extreme and symbolic violence has become a form communication in the context of weak Mexican state capacity and the presence of powerful organized crime groups. It is important not to exaggerate the use of symbolic violence in the Mexican “drug war,” as it can lead to false understandings. Before explaining how extreme violence is used in the context of Mexico, we must first understand Mexican drug violence in comparative and historical context.
Homicide rates in comparative perspective
Based upon media accounts in the United States, many believe that Mexico is [...]
Autopsy says Mexican drug lord Heriberto Lazcano killed by 2 gunshots to head, hit by 4 more
10/11/2012
MEXICO CITY (AP) – An autopsy carried out on the body of drug cartel leader Heriberto Lazcano before his body was stolen shows he died of six gunshot wounds, including two to the head, according to a forensic report released Thursday.
The Coahuila state prosecutors’ office said the autopsy determined Lazcano died of brain injuries, hemorrhaging, shock and blood loss. Lazcano, known as “El Lazca,” was a founder and one of two top leaders of the brutal Zetas drug cartel [...]
10/11/2012
A third self-described anarchist from the Pacific Northwest has been jailed by federal officials for refusing to speak before a secretive grand jury that the accused have called a politically-motivated modern-day witch-hunt.
Leah-Lynn Plante, a mid-20s activist from Seattle, Washington, was ushered out of court by authorities on Wednesday after refusing for a third time to answer questions forced on her by a grand jury — a panel of prosecutors convened to determine if an indictment can be issued for a federal crime.
Plante was one of a handful of people targeted in a series of raids [...]
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